Eid Al Adha (third day) 2027

Type of holiday: statutory public holiday, a non-working day.

The third day of Eid Al Adha, 12 Dhu al-Hijjah, is the last of the days granted for the festival under Cabinet Resolution No. 27 of 2024, and with it the longest continuous public holiday in the UAE year comes to an end. Counting from Arafah Day, the block has run four consecutive statutory days.

When the country actually goes back

That depends entirely on where the block finished. If this date falls on a Wednesday, offices reopen on the Thursday for a single day before the weekend, which in practice many people bridge with annual leave. If it falls on a Thursday or a Friday, the weekend follows immediately and the real return is the Monday, giving a break of six or seven days. If it falls on a Saturday or a Sunday, one or two of the granted days are absorbed by the weekend and nothing is given back, because the UAE has no substitute-day rule. The same four statutory days can therefore yield anything from four to seven days away from a desk depending on nothing more than the phase of the moon.

Why every day of the block has its own page

The calendar model behind this site pairs one date with one holiday. A four-day block is four rows, not one row with a range, and that is deliberate: a single combined entry would show one day off in the calendar and subtract one day from the working-day total, understating the closure by three days. The same approach is applied to the three days of Eid Al Fitr and the two days of Eid Al Etihad.

Dates for years still to come

Future-year dates shown on this site for the Islamic holidays are astronomical, derived from the Umm al-Qura calendar that Saudi Arabia and its neighbours use for civil purposes. They are a reliable expectation and nothing more. The confirmed dates come from the Council for Fatwa and the Cabinet, and the announcement of the days off typically arrives a few weeks ahead rather than a year ahead. A difference of one day between the projection and the declaration is common, and it can shift the whole four-day block.

The practical response is modest: treat a future Eid block as approximate to within a day, keep a day of slack on either side when booking travel or setting a contractual milestone near it, and re-check once the announcement has been made.